Tag Archives: occupy wall street

And then recently, I saw a story about research with rats. When one rat is trapped in an uncomfortable trap, a second rat will learn to free the trapped rat. They will do this generous act even before enjoying a tasty chocolate treat. Not only that, they will share the chocolate rather than hoard it for themselves. I have not clearly defined the word compassion for myself, but I think this is a decent example of animals showing compassion for each other and another one’s suffering.

And what can we learn from monkeys about how we use money, how we view equality, ? See this short video reaction of monkeys getting unfair trade values, or listen to this TED Talk by Laurie Santos for a more detailed description of this research.

So what makes us different? The only thing I have heard of being different so far, human’s have the ability to recognize their weaknesses and create a tool to overcome them. But I wouldn’t say we have mastered that yet.

Jennifer Pahlka’s TED Talk Coding for a Better Government gives and interesting viewpoint on ways to fix the U.S. government. She talks about addressing bureaucracy, which is the major underlying component of government, while politics is just a layer on top of that bureaucracy.

Some of you may be surprised to hear her idea that the Millennial generation has a surprising way to improve government. It’s a proven fact that government is slow and expensive to implement change. Private groups are able to create some of the needed valuable improvements, for much less expense.

I agree with Jennifer’s idea that the Millennials will improve our government and solve many of the current social problems, I even wrote about that idea recently in this blog post.